Chapter 14

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_ Chapter XIV

"All gone! 'tis ours the goodly land----
Look round--the heritage behold;
Go forth--upon the mountain stand;
Then, if you can, be cold."

Sprague.

It was an enterprising and manly thing for a little vessel like the Sea Lion to steer with an undeviating course into the mysterious depths of the antarctic circle--mysterious, far more in that day, than at the present hour. But the American sealer rarely hesitates. He has very little science, few charts, and those oftener old than new, knows little of what is going on among the savans of the earth, though his ear is ever open to the lore of men like himself, and he has his mind stored with pictures of islands and continents that would seem to have been formed for no other purpose than to meet the wants of the race of animals it is his business to pursue and to capture. Cape Horn and its vicinity have so long been frequented by this class of men, that they are at home among their islands, rocks, currents and sterility; but, to the southward of the Horn itself, all seemed a waste. At the time of which we are writing, much less was known of the antarctic regions than is known to-day; and even now our knowledge is limited to a few dreary outlines, in which barrenness and ice compete for the mastery. Wilkes, and his competitors, have told us that a vast frozen continent exists in that quarter of the globe; but even their daring and perseverance have not been able to determine more than the general fact.

We should be giving an exaggerated and false idea of Roswell Gardiner's character, did we say that he steered into that great void of the southern ocean in a total indifference to his destination and objects. Very much the reverse was his state of mind, as he saw the high land of the cape sink, as it might be foot by foot, into the ocean, and then lost sight of it altogether. Although the weather was fine for the region, it was dark and menacing. Such, indeed, is usually the case in that portion of this globe, which appears to be the favourite region of the storms. Although the wind was no more than a good breeze, and the ocean was but little disturbed, there were those symptoms in the atmosphere and in the long ground-swells that came rolling in from the southwest, that taught the mariner the cold lessons of caution. We believe that heavier gales of wind at sea are encountered in the warm than in the cold months; but there is something so genial in the air of the ocean during summer, and something so chilling and repulsive in the rival season, that most of us fancy that the currents of air correspond in strength with the fall of the mercury. Roswell knew better than this, it is true; but he also fully understood where he was, and what he was about. As a sealer, he had several times penetrated as far south as the ne plus ultra of Cook; but it had ever before been in subordinate situations. This was the first time in which he had the responsibility of command thrown on himself, and it was no more than natural that he should feel the weight of this new burthen. So long as the Sea Lion of the Vineyard was in sight, she had presented a centre of interest and concern. To get rid of her had been his first care, and almost absorbing object; but, now that she seemed to be finally thrown out of his wake, there remained the momentous and closely approaching difficulties of the main adventure directly before his eyes. Roswell, therefore, was thoughtful and grave, his countenance offering no bad reflection of the sober features of the atmosphere and the ocean.

Although the season was that of summer, and the weather was such as is deemed propitious in the neighbourhood of Cape Horn, a feeling of uncertainty prevailed over every other sensation. To the southward a cold mistiness veiled the view, and every mile the schooner advanced appeared like penetrating deeper and deeper into regions that nature had hitherto withheld from the investigation of the mariner. Ice, and its dangers, were known to exist a few degrees farther in that direction; but islands also had been discovered, and turned to good account by the enterprise of the sealers.

It was truly a great thing for the Sea Lion of Oyster Pond to have thrown off her namesake of the Vineyard. It is true both vessels were still in the same sea, with a possibility of again meeting; but, Roswell Gardiner was steering onward towards a haven designated in degrees and minutes, while the other craft was most probably left to wander in uncertainty in that remote and stormy ocean. Our hero thought there was now very little likelihood of his again falling in with his late consort, and this so much the more, because the islands he sought were not laid down in the vicinity of any other known land, and were consequently out of the usual track of the sealers. This last circumstance was fully appreciated by our young navigator, and gave him confidence of possessing its treasures to himself, could he only find the place where nature had hid them.

When the sun went down in that vast waste of water which lies to the southward of this continent, the little Sea Lion had fairly lost sight of land, and was riding over the long southwestern ground-swell like a gull that holds its way steadily towards its nest. For many hours her course had not varied half a point, being as near as possible to south-southwest, which kept her a little off the wind. No sooner, however, did night come to shut in the view, than Roswell Gardiner went aft to the man at the helm, and ordered him to steer to the southward, as near as the breeze would conveniently allow. This was a material change in the direction of the vessel, and, should the present breeze stand, would probably place her, by the return of light, a good distance to the eastward of the point she would otherwise have reached. Hitherto, it had been Roswell's aim to drop his consort; but, now it was dark, and so much time had already passed and been improved since the other schooner was last seen, he believed he might venture to steer in the precise direction he desired to go. The season is so short in those seas, that every hour is precious, and no more variation from a real object could be permitted than circumstances imperiously required. It was now generally understood that the craft was making the best of her way towards her destined sealing-ground.

Independently of the discoveries of the regular explorers, a great deal of information has been obtained from the sealers themselves within the present century, touching the antarctic seas. It is thought that many a headland, and various islands, that have contributed their shares in procuring the _accolades_ for different European navigators, were known to the adventurers from Stonington and other by-ports of this country, long before science ever laid its eyes upon them, or monarchs their swords on the shoulders of their secondary discoverers.

That divers islands existed in this quarter of the ocean was a fact recognised in geography long before the Sea Lion was thought of; probably before her young master was actually born; but the knowledge generally possessed on the subject was meagre and unsatisfactory. In particular cases, nevertheless, this remark would not apply, there being at that moment on board our little schooner several mariners who had often visited the South Shetlands, New Georgia, Palmer's Land, and other known places in those seas. Not one of them all, however, had ever heard of any island directly south of the present position of the schooner.

No material change occurred during the night, or in the course of the succeeding day, the little Sea Lion industriously holding her way toward the south pole; making very regularly her six knots each hour. By the time she was thirty-six hours from the Horn, Gardiner believed himself to be fully three degrees to the southward of it, and consequently some distance within the parallel of sixty degrees south. Palmer's Land, with its neighbouring islands, would have been near, had not the original course carried the schooner so far to the westward. As it was, no one could say what lay before them.

The third day out, the wind hauled, and it blew heavily from the north-east. This gave the adventurers a great run. The blink of ice was shortly seen, and soon after ice itself, drifting about in bergs. The floating hills were grand objects to the eye, rolling and wallowing in the seas; but they were much worn and melted by the wash of the ocean, and comparatively of greatly diminished size. It was now absolutely necessary to lose most of the hours of darkness it being much too dangerous to run in the night. The great barrier of ice was known to be close at hand; and Cook's "Ne Plus Ultra," at that time the great boundary of antarctic navigation, was near the parallel of latitude to which the schooner had reached. The weather, however, continued very favourable, and after the blow from the north-east, the wind came from the south, chill, and attended with flurries of snow, but sufficiently steady and not so fresh as to compel our adventurers to carry very short sail. The smoothness of the water would of itself have announced the vicinity of ice: not only did Gardiner's calculations tell him as much as this, but his eyes confirmed their results. In the course of the fifth day out, on several occasions when the weather cleared a little, glimpses were had of the ice in long mountainous walls, resembling many of the ridges of the Alps, though moving heavily under the heaving and setting of the restless waters. Dense fogs, from time to time, clouded the whole view, and the schooner was compelled, more than once that day, to heave-to, in order to avoid running on the sunken masses of ice, or fields, of which many of vast size now began to make their appearance.

Notwithstanding the dangers that surrounded our adventurers, they were none of them so insensible to the sublime powers of nature as to withhold their admiration from the many glorious objects which that lone and wild scene presented. The ice-bergs were of all the hues of the rainbow, as the sunlight gilded their summits or sides, or they were left shaded by the interposition of dark and murky clouds. There were instances when certain of the huge frozen masses even appeared to be quite black, in particular positions and under peculiar lights; while others, at the same instant, were gorgeous in their gleams of emerald and gold!

The aquatic birds, also, had now become numerous again. Penguins were swimming about, filling the air with their discordant cries, while there was literally no end of the cape-pigeons and petrels. Albatrosses, too, helped to make up the picture of animated nature, while whales were often heard blowing in the adjacent waters. Gardiner saw many signs of the proximity of land, and began to hope he should yet actually discover the islands laid down on his chart, as their position had been given by Daggett.

In that high latitude a degree of longitude is necessarily much shorter than when nearer to the middle of our orb. On the equator, a degree of longitude measures, as is known to most boarding-school young ladies, just sixty geographical, or sixty-nine and a half English statute miles. But, as is not known to most boarding-school young ladies, or is understood by very few of them indeed, even when known, in the sixty-second degree of latitude, a degree of longitude measures but little more than thirty-two of those very miles. The solution of this seeming contradiction is so very simple that it may assist a certain class of our readers if we explain it, by telling them that it arises solely from the fact that these degrees of longitude, which are placed sixty geographical miles asunder at the centre or middle of the earth, converge towards the poles, where they all meet in a point. According to the best observations Roswell Gardiner could obtain, he was just one of these short degrees of longitude, or two-and-thirty miles, to the westward of the parallel where he wished to be, when the wind came from the southward. The change was favourable, as it emboldened him to run nearer than he otherwise might have felt disposed to do, to the great barrier of ice which now formed a sort of weather-shore. Fortunately, the loose bergs and sunken masses had drifted off so far to the northward, that once within them the schooner had pretty plain sailing; and Roswell, to lose none of the precious time of the season, ventured to run, though under very short canvass, the whole of the short night that succeeded. It is a great assistance to the navigation of those seas that, during the summer months, there is scarcely any night at all, giving the adventurer sufficient light by which to thread his way among the difficulties of his pathless journey.

When the sun reappeared, on the morning of the sixth day after he had left the Horn, Roswell Gardiner believed himself to be far enough west for his purposes. It now remained to get a whole degree further to the south, which was a vast distance in those seas and in that direction, and would carry him a long way to the southward of the 'Ne Plus Ultra.' If there was any truth in Daggett, however, that mariner had been there; and the instructions of the owner rendered it incumbent on our young man to attempt to follow him. More than once, that morning, did our hero regret he had not entered into terms with the Vineyard men, that the effort might have been made in company. There was something so portentous in a lone vessel's venturing within the ice, in so remote a region, that, to say the truth, Roswell hesitated. But pride of profession, ambition, love of Mary, dread of the deacon, native resolution, and the hardihood produced by experience in dangers often encountered and escaped, nerved him to the undertaking. It must be attempted, or the voyage would be lost; and our young mariner now set about his task with a stern determination to achieve it.

By this time the schooner had luffed up within a cable's length of the ice, along the margin of which she was running under easy sail. Gardiner believed himself to be quite as far to the westward as was necessary, and his present object was to find an opening, by means of which he could enter among the floating chaos that was spread, far and wide, to windward. As the breeze was driving the drifting masses to the northward, they became loosened and more separated, every moment; and glad enough was Gardiner to discover, at length, a clear spot that seemed to favour his views. Without an instant's delay, the sheets were flattened in, a pull was taken on the braces, and away went the little Sea Lion into a passage that had a hundredfold more real causes of terror than the Scylla and Charybdis of old.

One effect of the vicinity of ice, in extensive fields, is to produce comparatively still water. It must blow a gale, and that over a considerable extent of open sea, to produce much commotion among the fields and bergs, though that heaving and setting, which has been likened to the respiration of some monster, and which seamen call the "ground-swell," is never entirely wanting among the waters of an ocean. On the present occasion, our adventurers were favoured in this respect, their craft gliding forward unimpeded by anything like opposing billows. At the end of four hours, the schooner, tacking and waring when necessary, had worked her way to the southward and westward, according to her master's reckoning, some five-and-twenty miles. It was then noon, and the atmosphere being unusually clear, though never without fog, Gardiner went aloft, to take a look for himself at the condition of things around him.

To the northward, and along the very passage by which the vessel had sailed, the ice was closing, and it was far easier to go on than to return. To the eastward, and towards the south-east in particular, however, did Roswell Gardiner turn his longing eyes. Somewhere in that quarter of the ocean, and distant now less than ten leagues, did he expect to find the islands of which he was in quest, if, indeed, they had any existence at all. In that direction there were many passages open among the ice, the latter being generally higher than in the particular place to which the vessel had reached. Once or twice, Roswell mistook the summits of some of these bergs for real mountains, when, owing to the manner in which the light fell upon them, or rather did not fall upon them directly, they appeared dark and earthy. Each time, however, the sun's rays soon came to undeceive him; and that which had so lately been black and frowning was, as by the touch of magic, suddenly illuminated, and became bright and gorgeous, throwing out its emerald hues, or perhaps a virgin white, that filled the beholder with delight, even amid the terrors and dangers by which, in very truth, he was surrounded. The glorious Alps themselves, those wonders of the earth, could scarcely compete in scenery with the views that nature lavished, in that remote sea, on a seeming void. But the might and honour of God were there, as well as beneath the equator.

For one whole hour did Roswell Gardiner remain in the cross-trees, having hailed the deck, and caused the schooner's head to be turned to the south-east, pressing her through the openings as near the wind as she could go. The atmosphere was never without fog, though the vapour drifted about, leaving large vacancies that were totally clear. One spot, in particular, seemed to be a favourite resting-place for these low clouds, which just there appeared to light upon the face of the ocean itself. A wide field of ice, or, it were better to say, a broad belt of bergs, lay between this stationary cloud and the schooner, though the existence of the vapour early caught Roswell's attention; and during the hour he was aloft, conning the craft through a very intricate and ticklish channel, not a minute passed that the young man did not turn a look towards that veiled spot. He was in the act of placing a foot on the ratlin below him, to descend to the deck, when he half-unconsciously turned to take a last glance at this distant and seemingly immovable object. Just then, the vapour, which had kept rolling and moving, like a fluid in ebullition, while it still clung together, suddenly opened, and the bald head of a real mountain, a thousand feet high, came unexpectedly into the view! There could be no mistake; all was too plain to admit of a doubt. There, beyond all question, was land; and it was doubtless the most western of the islands described by the dying seaman. Everything corroborated this conclusion. The latitude and longitude were right, or nearly so, and the other circumstances went to confirm the conjecture, or conclusion. Daggett had said that one island, high, mountainous, ragged and bleak, but of some size, lay the most westerly in the group, while several others were within a few miles of it. The last were lower, much smaller, and little more than naked rocks. One of these last, however, he insisted on it, was a volcano in activity, and that, at intervals, it emitted flames as well as a fierce heat. By his account, however, the party to which he belonged had never actually visited that volcanic cauldron, being satisfied with admiring its terrors from a distance.

As to the existence of the land, Roswell got several pretty distinct and certain views, leaving no doubt of its character and position. There is a theory which tells us that the orb of day is surrounded by a luminous vapour, the source of heat and light, and that this vapour, being in constant motion, occasionally leaves the mass of the planet itself to be seen, forming what it is usual to term the "spots on the sun." Resembling this theory, the fogs of the antarctic seas rolled about the mountain now seen, withdrawing the curtain at times, and permitting a view of the striking and majestic object within. Well did that lone and nearly barren mass of earth and rock merit these appellations! The elevation has already been given; and a rock that is nearly perpendicular, rising out of the ocean for a thousand feet, is ever imposing and grand. This was rendered so much the more so by its loneliness, its stable and stern position amid floating and moving mountains of ice, its brown sides and bald summit, the latter then recently whitened with a fall of pure snow, and its frowning and fixed aspect amid a scene that might otherwise be said to be ever in motion.

Roswell Gardiner's heart beat with delight when assured of success in discovering this, the first great goal of his destination. To reach it was now his all-absorbing desire. By this time the wind had got round to the southwest, and was blowing quite fresh, bringing him well to windward of the mountain, but causing the ice-bergs to drift in towards the land, and placing an impassable barrier along its western shore. Our young man, however, remembered that Daggett had given the anchorage as on the north-eastern side of the island, where, according to his statements, a little haven would be found, in which a dozen craft might lie in security. To this quarter of the island Gardiner consequently endeavoured to get.

There was no opening to the northward, but a pretty good channel was before the schooner to the southward of the group. In this direction, then, the Sea Lion was steered, and by eight bells (four in the afternoon) the southern point of the largest island was doubled. The rest of the group were made, and to the infinite delight of all on board her, abundance of clear water was found between the main island and its smaller neighbours. The bergs had grounded apparently, as they drew near the group, leaving this large bay entirely free from ice, with the exception of a few small masses that were floating through it. These bodies, whether field or berg, were easily avoided; and away the schooner went, with flowing sheets, into the large basin formed by the different members of the group. To render 'assurance doubly sure,' as to the information of Daggett, the smoke of a volcano arose from a rock to the eastward, that appeared to be some three or four miles in circumference, and which stood on the eastern side of the great basin, or some four leagues from Sealer's Land, as Daggett had at once named the principal island. This was, in fact, about the breadth of the main basin, which had two principal passages into it, the one from the south and the other from the north-east.

Once within the islands, and reasonably clear of all ice, it was an easy thing for the schooner to run across the basin, or great bay, and reach the north-eastern extremity of Sealer's Land. As the light would continue some hours longer, there being very little night in that high latitude in December, the month that corresponds to our June, Roswell caused a boat to be lowered and manned, when he pulled at once towards the spot where it struck him the haven must be found, if there were any such place at all. Everything turned out as it had been described by Daggett, and great was our young man's satisfaction when he rowed into a cove that was little more than two hundred yards in diameter, and which was so completely land-locked as not to feel the influence of any sea outside. In general, the great difficulty is to land on any of the antarctic rocks, the breakers and surf opposing it; but, in this spot, the smallest boat could be laid with its bows on a beach of shingles, without the slightest risk of its being injured. The lead also announced good anchorage in about eight fathoms of water. In a word, this little haven was one of those small basins that so often occur in mountainous islands, where fragments of rock appear to have fallen from the principal mass as it was forced upward out of the ocean, as if purposely intended to meet the wants of mariners.

Nor was the outer bay, or the large basin formed by the entire group, by any means devoid of advantages to the navigator. From north to south this outer bay was at least six leagues in length, while its breadth could not much have fallen short of four. Of course it was much more exposed to the winds and waves than the little harbour proper, though Roswell was struck with the great advantages it offered in several essential particulars. It was almost clear of ice, while so much was floating about outside of the circle of islands; thus leaving a free navigation in it for even the smallest boat. This was mainly owing to the fact that the largest island had two long crescent-shaped capes, the one at its north-eastern and the other at its south-eastern extremity, giving to its whole eastern side the shape of a new moon. The harbour just described was to the southward of, or within the north-eastern cape, which our young master at once named Cape Hazard, in honour of his chief mate's vigilance; that officer having been the first to point out the facilities probably offered by the formation of the land for an anchorage.

Though rocky and broken, it was by no means difficult to ascend the rugged banks on the northern side of the harbour, and Gardiner went up it, attended by Stimson, who of late had much attached himself to the person of his commander. The height of this barrier above the waves of the ocean was but a little less than a hundred feet, and when the summit was reached, a common exclamation of surprise, not to say delight, broke from the lips of both. Hitherto not a seal of any sort had been seen, and Gardiner had felt some misgivings touching the benefits that were to be derived from so much hardship, exposure and enterprise. All doubts, however, vanished, the instant he got a sight of the northern shore of the island. This shore, a reach of several miles in extent, was fairly alive with the monsters of which he was in search. They lay in thousands on the low rocks that lined that entire side of the island, basking in the sun of the antarctic seas. There they were, sure enough! Sea Lions, Sea Elephants, huge, clumsy, fierce-looking and revolting creatures, belonging properly to neither sea nor land. These animals were constantly going and coming in crowds, some waddling to the margin of the rocks and tumbling into the ocean in search of food, while others scrambled out of the water, and got upon shelves and other convenient places to repose and enjoy the light of day. There was very little contention or fighting among these revolting-looking creatures, though nearly every known species of the larger seals was among them.

"There is famous picking for us, master Stephen," said Roswell to his companion, fairly rubbing his hands in delight. "One month's smart work will fill the schooner, and we can be off before the equinox. Does it not seem to you that yonder are the bones of sea lions, or of seals of some sort, lying hereaway as if men had been at work on the creatures?"

"No doubt on't at all, Captain Gar'ner; as much out of the way as this island is--and I never heard of the place afore, old a sealer as I am--but, as much out of the way as it is, we are not the first to find it. Somebody has been here, and that within a year or two; and he has picked up a cargo, too, depend on't."

As all this merely corresponded with Daggett's account of the place, Roswell felt no surprise; on the contrary, he saw in it a confirmation of all that Daggett had stated, and as furnishing so much the more reason to hope for a successful termination to the voyage in all its parts. While on the rocks, Roswell took such a survey of the localities as might enable him to issue his orders hereafter with discretion and intelligence. The schooner was already making short tacks to get close in with the island, in obedience to a signal to that effect; and the second mate had pulled out to the entrance of the little haven, with a view to act as pilot. Before the captain had descended from the summit of the northern barrier, the vessel came in under her jib, the wind being nearly aft, and she dropped two anchors in suitable spots, making another flying moor of it.

General joy now illuminated every face. It was, in itself, a great point gained to get the schooner into a perfectly safe haven, where her people could take their natural rest at night, or during their watches below, without feeling any apprehension of being crushed in the ice; but here was not only security, but the source of that wealth of which they were in quest, and which had induced them all to encounter so many privations and so much danger. The crew landed to a man, each individual ascending to the summit of the barrier, to feast his eyes on the spectacle that lay spread in such affluent abundance, along the low rocks of the northern side of the island.

As there were yet several hours of light remaining, Roswell, still attended by Stimson, each armed with a sealing spear or lance, not only as a weapon of defence but as a leaping-staff, set out to climb as high up the central acclivity of the island as circumstances would allow him to go. He was deceived in the distances, however, and soon found that an entire day would be necessary to achieve such an enterprise, could it be performed at all; but he did succeed in reaching a low spur of the central mountain that commanded a wide and noble view of all that lay to the north and east of it. From this height, which must have been a few hundred feet above the level of the ocean, our adventurers got a still better view of the whole north coast, or of what might have been called the sealing quarter of the island. They also got a tolerably accurate idea of the general formation of that lone fragment of rock and earth, as well as of the islets and islands that lay in its vicinity. The outline of the first was that of a rude, and of course an irregular triangle, the three principal points of which were the two low capes already mentioned, and a third that lay to the northward and westward. The whole of the western or south-western shore seemed to be a nearly perpendicular wall of rock, that, in the main, rose some two or three hundred feet above the ocean. Against this side of the island in particular, the waves of the ocean were sullenly beating, while the ice drove up 'home,' as sailors express it; showing a vast depth of water. On the two other sides, it was different. The winds prevailed most from the south-west, which rendered the perpendicular face of the island its weather-wall; while the two other sides of the triangle were more favoured by position. The north side, of course, lay most exposed to the sun, everything of this nature being reversed in the southern hemisphere from what we have it in the northern; while the eastern or north-eastern side, to be precisely accurate, was protected by the group of islands that lay in its front. Such was the general character of Sealer's Land, so far as the hurried observations of its present master enabled him to ascertain. The near approach of night induced him now to hasten to get off of the somewhat dangerous acclivities to which he had climbed, and to rejoin his people and his schooner. _

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